Bloodlines
by Just Another Soul
Summary: An idyllic day for Sawyer the Cleaner quickly turns sour when unwelcome guests arrive in her abattoir. A bizarre account of families, acquaintances, and hunters. In other words, a typical day in Roanapur. Multi-chapter story. Companion of Butcher and Bloodlust.
1. Prologue

**Bloodlines**

**N/A: **Getting back into writing, or trying to. I've decided to put this in the crossover section due to how heavily the_ Texas Chainsaw Massacre_ (and to some extent, _Hostel_) franchise will be intertwined in this story, but, as with all my stories here, this fanfic is in the world of Black Lagoon.

This fanfic is linked with the stories, Bloodlust (co-written with Amigodude) and Butcher.

**Disclaimers:  
**Black Lagoon and its characters © Rei Hiroe  
The Texas Chainsaw Massacre © New Line Cinema  
Hostel © Lionsgate

* * *

**PROLOGUE: THE LAST SEQUEL**

A tired woman, an angry woman, walked slowly to the entrance of Roanapur. There were hollers and obscenities shouted out the windows of the passing cars. What the hell was wrong with the bitch in the daisy dukes? Who walks in the middle of the damned road?

The steel toed boots tapped heavily along the broken concrete until she came to the noose dangling from the frame of the large bridge. Cars swerved to avoid her and more obscenities were said. It didn't seem to register in her ears, her head hung low, dark tendrils of hair clinging to her forehead. The afternoon sun was downright unbearable. The small bursts of wind caused by passing cars were a small blessing.

She wiped the sweat from her brow and looked up at the noose. This was the greeting for all who entered this wicked city, wasn't it? A noose, a warning. She held up a hand to block the bright rays overhead to get a better look. A noose? No, from the angle where she was standing, the way she saw it, the way it swayed back and forth in the breeze, it reminded her more of a fish hook, a lure.

How suitable. Was there any wonder why killers swarmed to this shithole? No more needed to be pondered.

A small, feral smile came upon her lips.

"The hunt is over, chainsaw bitch."


	2. Chapter 1

**CHAPTER ONE: ROTTEN TREE**

"Hey, hey! A shot of rum and you're already hanging over the bar at happy hour? Who are you and what did ya do with Two Hand?"

Revy grumbled at Eda's obnoxious jest. The gunslinger lifted her head, bloodshot eyes attempting to focus on the blonde nun in sorority slut attire.

"Don't fuckin' tell me you've been poppin' yaba like candy again," Eda drawled, draping an arm over Revy's shoulders while her other hand dangled a glass of whiskey from her fingertips. "Didn't you pay attention in school? Drugs are bad for you. You're getting just as bad as that maid." With a laugh, Eda took a sip of her drink.

Behind the bar, Bao's brown eyes looked down lazily, transfixed on the glass he was polishing. He silently hoped banter between the gun women was all he had to deal with tonight. The wet heat, miserable as it was, served as a tempering mechanism. Not a single gunfight broke out in his bar within a week since the heat wave struck. The humidity sapped any motivation the would-be ne'er do wells had to brawl, and the Vietnamese bartender made note to hold off on fixing his air conditioner for perhaps two weeks longer. The incentive mattered.

"Don't fuckin' compare me to glasses bitch." Revy gripped her own empty glass to the point Eda swore she saw a crack forming. With a sudden inhale, a drop of Bao's sweat fell onto the dirty shot glass in his hand; it wasn't caused by the heat. "Hate her type. Seekin' redemption in a black hole, blowing up the fuckin' city for a vendetta no one gives two shits about."

"What are you bitching about?" Eda took her hand off of Revy and spread her arms wide. "Thought you were used to people bringing bad blood to this part of the woods. C'mon, Revy, we're the wretched hive. If newcomers didn't come to shake things up every once in a while, Roanapur would just be a tin crab shack on a mound of sand."

"There's a difference between shaking things up and going apeshit," Revy droned with a curled lip. Eda shrugged.

"You really have been taking too much yaba," Eda observed. "Two Hand having a jab at reason, it's not normal. Why don't you go back to talking about money and guns?"

"Fuck you." Revy placed her forehead on the bar and extended the finger that counted.

"There we go!" Eda said, seemingly satisfied. However, the blonde's smile was short-lived and she set her drink back onto the bar.

"You know, speaking of shaking things up..."

Revy looked back at the faux nun.

"I've been hearing something about a bitch in daisy dukes trolling around the city, asking about a cleaning woman with a chainsaw. You wouldn't happen to know anything about that, would you?" The pink sunglasses Eda wore did nothing to hide the sudden darkness in her eyes.

Revy shrugged.

"Hell if I know. Why should I care?"

"Really?" Eda asked lowly. "I know you and that chainsaw woman don't have the best... relations. That old fiasco with the kids on the boat. But I know you well enough to know you're not the type to go talking about old business. So I like to think."

"Then what the fuck are you suggesting?" Revy raised her head and sat up straight, eyes straining with a scowl.

"Just sayin', out of common courtesy-"

Revy snorted. Eda's face remained unreadable.

"The fact is: there's word out that a bitch in denim shorts and boots with guns is running around thinking to cause trouble. There's a score to settle and whether you're involved or not isn't the issue. There's something going on that's making you _look_ like you have something to do with the drama."

"Doesn't concern me," Revy said. "I don't know anything. And why're you acting like it's some hot gossip if it _sounds_ like I'm finishing up old business. I'm Revy Two Hand, no one gives a shit if I'm waving 'round a gun. You're being fuckin' paranoid, and if this is about Spooky Chick, I can tell you that I sure as hell have nothing to do with it."

She swung around on the bar stool and stood to her feet with a light sway. The long breath Bao had been containing since Revy cracked her shot glass was released.

Before making her way toward the doors of the Yellow Flag, Revy looked back at Eda one last time.

"Really. Don't know. Don't care. Sayonara."

-0 – 0 – 0 -

The light flickered above, the bulb centered in a black, cone-shaped lamp attached to slim black cord, dangling from a crusty ceiling. The tiny room was an awful tint of yellowish-green, the wallpaper, or what little was left of it, crumpled and showed signs of black mold. Pushed against one of the walls were three large, black filing cabinets. In the center, a rickety table. At the table, a small woman with pale skin and dark blue eyes, gathering up a sizable pile of papers and sorting through the organized mess of words and numbers.

Body disposal at UG Pork wasn't all blood and gore. It was a legitimate meat packing business, after all. There was always a considerable amount of paperwork that had to be done.

Sawyer "the Cleaner" attempted to scratch at the jagged scar about her neck, only for a sharp nail to bump into her electrolarynx collar. She weaved a finger underneath the leather strap and scratched as she curled her lip, tempted to say to hell with it all and cram the paper work into a not-so-faraway crematory. Her hand moved from her neck to her head and she proceeded to scratch the side of her scalp, spidery little fingers moving through a mass of black hair. Her mouth moved in a silent groan and she leaned back in her chair, a few pages falling haplessly to the cracked concrete floor as her arms hanged limply at her sides.

"**Stupid...**" droned the static monotone from the speaker mounted on her neck. She simply loathed office work. The pale woman absentmindedly wondered if she should have put out a classified ad for a paper pusher.

"**Enough...**" Sawyer stood from the table and the papers scattered about. She was tired of office work. It was time to clean up.

Hanging next to the door of her office was a set of cleaning gear: surgeon scrubs, goggles, apron and rubber gloves. With lackluster, she stripped her gothic attire and changed into her work clothes. She stretched her hands above her head in preparation, mentally readying herself for the task ahead. She didn't have any bodies to butcher, unfortunately, but the walls and tables of her "cleaning station" needed a secondary scrubbing and her additional saws needed to be cleaned, lest they rusted.

Lazily, she shut off the light in her office and closed the door behind her. As she walked down a creaking metal staircase, past archaic meat hooks dangling from the ceiling and into a dark hallway, she had the menial tasks mapped out in her head. Cleaning, back to paperwork, more cleanup, locking up. Perhaps there would be a rush call in the middle of the night and she'd have to drive the van to pick up the meat. It was nothing. It was normalcy. A work schedule. Just an everyday routine for Roanapur's friendliest cleaner.

-0 – 0 – 0 -

"OHMYGOD, PLEASE, YOU GOTTA HELP ME!"

It took a moment for Sawyer to register what was going on when she opened the door.

In the center of _her _abattoir, in_ her_ cleaning station, amidst wooden crates packed with dismembered bodies and blood-stained (ironically) stainless steel tables, stood a distraught young woman in her mid-late twenties. Her dirty blonde hair was piled atop her head in a scraggly fashion, her midriff bare and an endowed bosom straining against a hot pink tank top emblazoned with what could only be discerned as the state of Texas colored in with the its iconic flag design, with an "I" and a large red heart placed above the shape. A tight denim mini-skirt hugged her lightly tanned hips to the point it seemed it was going to rip off at any given moment. Her bra straps and thong, peeking unapologetically from her top and skirt, were black. She stood bow-legged in desperation, her red Converse sneakers squeaking on the tiled floor. Her long, magenta nails clasped sporadically at her face, baby blue eyes wide in panic and pink lips speaking in tongues, only a second later to be decoded as gibbering.

Sawyer silently cursed herself for leaving her chainsaw on the table, which was inconveniently behind the garish woman.

Sawyer wondered immediately how she got into her plant, and as if reading her mind, the dirty blonde spoke.

"The door was open, so I let myself in." The woman said it as though the sentence explained everything.

"**... Do I... know you...?**"

"Fred-Fred! I'll be damned! You sound just like Mama Sawyer!" the mystery woman chirped with a Southern drawl. She smiled for a brief moment. "Had a bad run-in with a boyfriend or somethin'? I get it. Shit happens. Hahaha!"

Sawyer sneered behind the mask of her surgeon scrubs. The laughter hit her like a truck. She knew that obnoxious sound anywhere.

"**Jenny...**"

"Bingo!" the dirty blonde said with a snap. "Betch'a didn't recognize me without the pigtails and prairie dress, huh? Guess ya wouldn't what with you runnin' away 'n' all. We never did see each other much after Uncle Tech made that hammer gizmo for me and our guests went all loony with the shotgun 'n' stuff."

Sawyer still eyed her chainsaw; it was beckoning behind Jenny.

"You got lucky, y'know," Jenny pointed out. "We were all at the house party while you were hangin' out in the trailer with Aunt Luda Mae and Aunt Kathy 'n' her kids. Ya'll got to avoid that mess with the cops afterwards."

"**I thought... You were stuck... in juvie...**" Sawyer said. "**Heard they... took you for a ride... in the car...**"

"And a few others in the family, but y'know how we are," Jenny shrugged, as if it were a well-known secret between the two. "It wasn't that bad. Sent me to a mental facility and then I got released to some relatives near Waco. Figure that. Ah ha!" Jenny snorted.

"**Uh huh...**" Sawyer began to creep along the side of wall.

"They was alright, I guess, even with Uncle W.'s crossdressing thing," Jenny said, chewing on her lip. "Though Uncle Vilmer and Aunt Darla were kinda weird with their conspiracy talk 'n' stuff. Somethin' wasn't right with 'em. After livin' with 'em for a couple years, I could kinda see why the rest of the family disowned 'em. Soon as I hit sixteen, I got outta there. Just in time, too. Heard Uncle Vilmer got in an accident with an airplane or somethin'. Slit his neck open with a propeller! Can you imagine?"

Sawyer only nodded and continued to inch along the wall. Jenny always did like to hear herself talk.

"Heard you and the family back at the ol' house got a run-in with some Chinese bitch. Nasty business. Sorry to hear 'bout your daddy, Fred."

Jenny didn't sound sorry.

Sawyer's hand twitched. Her solid, dark blue eyes were strained. Only a few more steps to the chainsaw.

"So, I'm guessin' you're wonderin' why I'm here, right?" Jenny said, putting her hands on her hips. "Why is long-lost cousin Jenny all the way here in some stinky crab shack in Thailand to talk to Fred-Fred? Well, I'll tell you."

One step. Two steps. Sawyer only listened half-heartedly, making her way around a wooden box pressed against the wall. Her foot slipped and she almost lost her balance on the blood leaking out of the bottom.

"Careful there," Jenny said unhelpfully.

Sawyer was almost at the table now and her precious weapon was within reach. One more body to clean. It was nothing. Just a routine.

"Now, what was I sayin'?" Jenny looked to the ceiling and absentmindedly swiped Sawyer's chainsaw off the table.

The small cleaner's spirit broke a little. Two black gloves formed fists at her side.

"Oh, such a lovely piece of work," Jenny appraised, holding the saw up. Light gleamed off the guide bar. "What _was_ I sayin'? Oh, right. Why I'm here. Y'see, there's this bitch with a shotgun. Real crazy bitch. You remember that time when Uncle Chop Top and your daddy got those guests from the radio station? You know, at the amusement park where some of the clan sorta got blown up? Not that it was a big deal or nothin'. We always spring back from stuff like that and-"

"**Get... to... the point...**"

"Lord, you're impatient," Jenny snarled. "Anyway, one of the guests, the DJ with the daisy dukes that stole Great-Grandma's chainsaw and knocked ol' Uncle Chop Top off the paper mache Matterhorn. Her name, I can't remember it real well." Jenny scratched her head.

"Verdita... Vernita... Vanita "Stretch" somethin' or other. I don't really care; it don't matter. Now, see, she disappeared for a couple years. Just some nut we forgot about. Well, I find out while the family was havin' a nice dinner with a lovely couple from California some time back, this bitch goes stormin' in with guns blazin' all over the damn place and the house is shot up to kingdom come. Killed everyone in sight except for cousin Gunny, on a counta he was probably runnin' away and pissin' his pants. He didn't add that part in when he track me down and tell me, but I know it from the look in his lazy eye."

Sawyer started at that statement and lost herself.

"**Gunny... ran away..?. But... he told me...**" Sawyer quickly shut up.

Not quickly enough.

"What?" Jenny asked. "Told ya what? Did he visit you too or somethin'?"

"**... A while ago...**" That was all Sawyer said. No need to divulge in details about Hell Gardens and boat rides.

"Oh, let me guess," Jenny said with a curled lip and a sway of her hips. "He tried to come off all badass 'n' shit and told you he killed off the whole family, the traitor. I could smell it on him. Damn it, Fred-Fred, ever since that crap with your momma, you been scared stiff of him and he got off on it. Where is he? Runnin' around this shit heap and jumpin' out like the big bad boogy man to make you piss yourself while he gets his nuts off?"

"**Vulgar bitch...**" Sawyer snapped. "**He died... drowned... that's all.**" No more details.

"Just as well," Jenny said carelessly and closed her eyes, the chainsaw hanging limply from her fingertips as she shrugged. "As Uncle Hoyt used to say, we don't need him contaminatin' the world. He was a dumbass anyway. Gross, too. Can you believe he tried to hit on me while I was at work? We ain't even kissin' cousins. Then he got all pissy when I said 'No' and stormed out. What a fuckin' loser."

"**Well... you know how he got... around Roadhouse girls...**" Sawyer said with a smirk underneath her mask.

"Fred-Fred, you best shut the fuck up before I rip off that voice thingy 'roud your neck," Jenny threatened. "I wasn't no damn hooker. I will have you know I had a very respectable position as the assistant manager at a Wuttaburger in Waco."

"**I envy you,**" Sawyer said. The static monotone emphasized her sarcasm.

"Shut up," Jenny said, pointing the end of Sawyer's chainsaw at her. "I loved that job. I got free apple fritters. But anyway, back to the story. While I'm in the middle of dealin' with an unsavory customer, this crazy fuckin' bitch busts into the restaurant in broad fuckin' daylight and starts asking for me by name! Being a creature of survival, as we Sawyers are known to be, I gathered myself and ran out the back as she shot up the place. It was all over the news at the time. Cops never got her, though. That bitch is slick."

"**And you... are here... because...?**" Sawyer was silently contemplating on a strategy to get her chainsaw back. It wasn't that she didn't trust Jenny. Surely, her cousin was too weak to pull the ripcord effectively. She just didn't want the dirty blonde to contaminate her precious "pet" with her germs. Lord knew where Jenny's hands had been...

"Okay, so maybe your Roadhouse comment wasn't totally uncalled for," Jenny confessed. "I couldn't go back to my job, so I had to fall back into the bad places. You know the ones. Well, one night I was in bed with this stud-muffin with a bloodhound tattoo on his shoulder and he tells me about this place, a kind of place where'd I get good business. He had connections, see. Somewhere in underground Vegas, there was a murder resort, some sort of hostel business."

Sawyer's blood ran cold at the words. Jenny didn't seem to notice.

"If I could lead some healthy young individuals to this 'resort' and put them in a state of false security, well, I would get a rather good paycheck. Heck, you know our background, Fred. Leading some lambs to the slaughter would be just like scopin' out guests for us back home. So, I'm just a damn fine natural when I start workin' at the hostel. Somethin' 'bout a country girl on vacation that gets the guys all nice-nice."

Sawyer didn't like this story at all. It hit too close to home.

"Well, I work there for a couple of months and every now and again, I'd talk to the cleaners. Then, one day I hear about this legendary butcher in Thailand, a creepy little ghost woman with a chainsaw. Got a nice lil' feelin' in my gut it was cousin Freddy."

"**...Blind luck... that was all...**"

"No, no, had to be you. I got quite a bit of info to prove it," Jenny teased. "Betcha don't know it, but you got quite a lil' followin' goin' on in the hostel business. Most of the stories are pretty gruesome, but the ways a couple of 'em talk 'bout you... you gotta fucked up little fanbase, Fred-Fred."

"**Enough,**" Sawyer said. "**Why... are... you here?**"

"Ah! Well, y'see, when I was getting' all comfortable with some Swedish tourists in a hot tub, guess who comes in to ruin the mood? Yup! Shotgun bitch with her daisy dukes. She's got this crazy fuckin' look in her eye and I'm runnin' 'round in nothin' but my birthday suit while those tourists are reduced to red soup. Then she got slowed down by some big guys in leather jackets and that was the last I see of her. Yet..." Jenny paused. She gulped loudly and a droplet of sweat broke out onto her brow. "Fred-Fred, I was lucky to get outta there alive, but while I was running away she was saying she was gonna get me like she did the rest of the family. She wasn't gonna stop until every Sawyer is dead, and people who say things like that don't die easy."

"**Uh... huh... and what... do you want... me... to do about it?**"

"Were you dropped on your head or somethin'?" Jenny scolded, slamming the chainsaw back down on the table. Sawyer took note of this as Jenny took a step toward her. "Didn't you hear me the first time? I _need_ your help. I tracked you down because I can't take that crazy bitch down all by myself. I know we were never on the best terms with each other, but we gotta forget all that nonsense. We _need_ each other right now, Fred."

"**Why don't you... ask... some other members?**"

"Because all the family members that coulda helped are either dead, in prison, or in a mental facility," Jenny stated matter-in-factly. Jenny placed her hands atop Sawyer's shoulders. "_You_ are the only one who can help. The fate of the Sawyer family rests with _us_!"

Jenny lifted her hands off of Sawyer, and the small ghost-like woman took off her goggles and facemask. She stared deeply, contemplatively into Jenny's eyes, then turned her attention to the chainsaw on the table. Sawyer drifted to her weapon and gently picked it up, looking at her reflection in the guide bar.

The fate of the Sawyer family, huh?

Slowly, with her chainsaw in hand, Frederica Sawyer turned around and took a deep breath. Jenny clasped her hands together in anticipation and smiled brightly, nodding hopefully.

"**Not helping.**"

Jenny's face dropped.

"What?"

"**I said... I'm not... helping you.**"

"Fred, what-?"

"**I'm not... helping you,**" Sawyer repeated. She walked past Jenny with the chainsaw in hand, her head hanging low.

"Bullshit, you ain't helpin' me!" Jenny barked. "Don't you be givin' me the same crap you were back on the homestead, Fred. You may act like you're some fuckin' house cat that can live on her own while she licks her own ass, but that ain't you. You're a _Sawyer_, Fred. We're pack animals. We need our own beside us. There ain't no other way we can live. We die out quick if we scatter."

Sawyer gave her a blank stare.

"Fred-Fred," Jenny hissed pleadingly. She placed her hand on the engine block of Sawyer's weapon. "_The saw is family_. It is in our name. It is in our blood. You cannot turn on the clan now. We need each other."

"**No... **_**You**_** need... **_**me**_**, and I... will have nothing... to do... with **_**your**_** problems...**"

"Fred-Fred," Jenny said through clenched teeth. "You selfish bitch. You're turnin' your back on family."

"**I have... no family,**" she said. "**Fred-Fred ran away... a long time ago... It's just... Sawyer... now.**"

"You claim you got no family, and yet you're still using the name? Sounds pretty fuckin' dirty, Fred," Jenny spat.

"**The name just... has a … nice ring to it,**" Sawyer admitted with a grim smile. "**That's all... I have... to say.**" The cleaner placed her hand on the knob.

"Fred, think about what you're sayin'," Jenny said now in desperation, eyes flickering in a silent plea. "You're gonna regret this!"

Sawyer ignored her and opened the door. Her cold, apathetic, half-lidded eyes grew as she found herself staring down the barrel of a shotgun.

Vanita Stretch grinned.

* * *

**A/N:** How ever will Sawyer get out of this one? Why, magic and friendship, of course. And ponies. Lots of ponies.

Doc Gonzo brought to my attention that in the third film's commentary, Vanita "Stretch" Brock decided to make it her mission in life to hunt down the Sawyers after the events in the second movie. Well, damn, there's a mighty fine story right there.

Cousin Jenny – Name derived from the actress, Jennifer Banko, who played the little girl in the third TCM movie. "Crush that nice man's head with a hammer, sweetie!" Yeah, _that_ kid.

Cheers.


	3. Chapter 2

**CHAPTER TWO: THE CLAN**

Everyone has their story, and they don't get much worse than the lot that settles in Roanapur. An annual festival could be held on the baggage floating in Thailand's darkest waters with competitions and banners proclaiming such things as "Highest Body Count," "Most Lucrative Brothel," "Junkie of the Year," or "Most Daddy Issues." However, the denizens of Roanapur are not a festive peoples and are a rather dour sort. There are no parades in Roanapur. There is no sense of tradition. It is a place of transition, and it is a land that has no song or tale to celebrate it. For just as people pay little mind to the origins of Roanapur, once a pithy trading route turned into Hell's waiting room, they could care less about the history of those who inhabit it.

But everyone still has their stories. If prompted, properly, with the correct drink or monetary bribe, most villains could find a minute or two to listen.

This is the tale of Vanita "Stretch" Brock in a Roanapur minute.

Once upon a time, Vanita "Stretch" Brock was a nice lady who happened to be the DJ of a local radio station in Waco. She was a quintessential brunette-haired Texas gal with daisy dukes and boots that could kick down a fort. Simply said, she had spunk. Everything was hunky dory in her life until she received a call on her station: two drunk teenagers screaming their heads off about some chainsaw wielding psychos. When the line went dead, she and her trusty companion, L.G., shook it off as a crank call.

Then the local sheriff, "Lefty" Enright, got involved. The good old sheriff printed an article about a string of chainsaw killings across McLennan County shortly after. Stretch, being a curious gal, called the good old sheriff and let him listen to the tape of the now-non-crank call. Well, what would you know? It was just the piece of evidence poor Lefty needed to convince the rest of the law abiding community to take these chainsaw killings seriously. He asked Stretch to air the tape to raise awareness, and being a downright helpful gal, Stretch agreed.

Well, it just so happened that a rambunctious family known as the Sawyers got wind of the airing over the radio, and they decided it was going to be a mighty fine idea to pay Stretch a visit.

That's all there is for Stretch's Roanapur minute.

Everything after that is just details.

- 0 – 0 – 0 -

Vanita Stretch grinned.

"Knock knock."

There was a thunderous blast and a large patch of the ceiling was reduced to powder. The barrel rested atop the guide bar of the pale woman's chainsaw. A quick reaction, the cleaner had jerked the bar up at the last second and ruined her aim.

"You fucking turd," Stretch snarled.

Before Stretch could let loose another round, Sawyer swung the chainsaw in an upward arch and knocked the gun out of Stretch's hands. The cleaner reached for the ripcord, but had no time to pull it when Stretch whipped out a 1911 and began to empty the magazine. Sawyer had no choice but to hold up the guide bar to block the rounds. The small cleaner inwardly cursed. Even with its custom alterations, at such a close distance, the bullets were making visible dents in the reinforced guide bar.

Stretch swiped at Sawyer's feet with a steel-toed boot. Soon the cleaner's view of Stretch switched to a view of the ceiling. Still gripping her weapon, the chainsaw flew above her head, leaving her exposed. Vanita "Stretch" took aim at Sawyer's chest.

Then she took a hit to the jaw with a mallet. Stretch fell to the floor with a painful moan.

"Get up, Fred!" Jenny screamed, the mallet still in hand. The hysteric blonde yanked her cousin off the floor and sprinted out of the room.

"Good thing I was always good with hammers!" Jenny panted. "Wish you'd had a sledgehammer, though. This dinky thing is only good for-"

A piece of the wall disintegrated behind them as a shotgun blast reverberated down the hallway.

"**Shut... up... Keep... running...**"

Sawyer took the opportunity to pull the ripcord and start the engine of her chainsaw. They reached the end of the corridor, now in the main section of the abattoir. Old wooden crates with contents that could only be guessed at were piled into random towers around an archaic conveyor belt. The rusty hooks hanged overhead and Jenny conjured a palpable gulp. The blonde also caught Sawyer sneaking off into nondescript shadows out of the corner of her eye. Jenny's lip curled.

"Hey!" Jenny stomped her foot on the concrete. "Come back here, you little cunt!"

She squealed and ducked to the floor as a flash and bang lit up the room before it returned to its usual, grim atmosphere. An old hook clambered to the floor in front of her. Jenny crawled on all fours underneath the conveyor belt.

Stretch's voice echoed through the room.

"Thought you got me there with that hammer, didn't ya? Your clan was as stupid as they were mean, but I picked up a nice lesson from that creepy fellow with the plate in his head." Stretch stepped out of the corridor while rubbing her jaw. "I got a mighty fine gift from your dearly departed Aunt Darla."

"You went after Aunt Darla?" Jenny growled.

Stretch brandished her shotgun and flipped a ragged brunette lock over her shoulder.

"Some years ago, I managed to track down that beaten broad while she was kneelin' on a fresh grave. Some nut with a plane sliced her late husband's neck open with a propeller. Inventive trick, I gotta say. I wish I could have been there to see it. She whacked me with the shovel used to dig the plot," Stretch said. "No worries, though. I painted the grave red and put her straight to sleep. It was a mighty fine funeral for the Sawyer couple."

"Bitch, you got some nerve! She was just some poor gal from Waxahachie that got mixed up with the family!" Jenny shouted. "Aunt Darla got beaten black and blue by Uncle Vilmer so I wouldn't have it. She might not a'been right in the head, but she was a good woman. She didn't deserve none of that!"

"I'd be thinking from her blubbering at the dirt that I was doing her a favor," Stretch said as she searched for Jenny voice through the darkness. "Kept saying something about her hubbie implanting a bomb in her brain or something. She had a hard time sleeping at night, it seemed. I thought it only proper to give her some relief."

"Lousy cunt," Jenny sneered. "Hope she fucked you up real good with the shovel."

Somewhere in the shadows, Sawyer waited. Let Jenny get riled up, she thought. It would place less attention on her.

Stretch, meanwhile, flashed a smile in the dark.

"Oh, she put up a good fight. I had to eat things through a straw for a minute, but the doctors fixed me up with a nice replacement." Stretch tapped her stainless steel mandible with a grin. "Your little mallet didn't do me any harm."

Jenny's eyes widened when she felt something pressed into the back of her skull.

"But I take it you ain't like your ol' Uncle Chop Top. Hell, even if _you_ had a steel plate in your head, I doubt it would do much against a 12 gauge slug." Stretch fingered the trigger. "I'm real glad your cousin followed the family business, what with the slaughterhouse and such. Ya'll are such a helpful bunch when it comes to cleanin' up your bodies afterwards."

Jenny's breath went ragged. Upon hearing the sound, Stretch's pearly white teeth seemed to shine in the dark. She placed her hand on the pump of the shotgun.

The rattle of chains and a mechanical roar tore through the abattoir. Both Stretch and Jenny looked up and saw Sawyer holding onto a hook and sliding in their direction. Vanita lifted her shotgun and felt the thick sole of a leather boot hitting her square in the face. The shotgun dropped to the floor and Stretch landed flat on her back on the conveyor belt. In turn, Sawyer released the rickety hook and let it glide away on the line of rope and chain. The cleaner landed at Stretch's feet and swung her chainsaw over her head, preparing for the killing blow.

She fell off the belt when a bullet bit her in the leg.

- 0 – 0 – 0 -

"Rotton, I never ask you. How much you spend on this thing?"

A metallic blue 1969 Ford Mustang convertible with white racing stripes sped through the outskirts of the city. The lights of Roanapur's side roads zipped by Shenhua's vision like fireflies, and despite the expert precision of the cosmetic skills she had acquired in her time with Leigarch, the sporty suspension of the vehicle (on the not-so-well paved roads) she was currently riding in presented a challenge as she tried to apply her lipstick.

"That is my concern," Rotton said simply, as a man who had a full comprehension of his financial situation would say if he had spent an ungodly amount of money on something he could barely afford.

"We have three lucky job with good pay and then you do this," Shenhua sighed. "What was wrong with Range Rover you already have? Was okay car. Get job done."

"The Range Rover wasn't really cool," Rotton intoned. "This car is."

Shenhua couldn't exactly disagree with him. She wished, sometimes, the silver-haired mercenary would be more sensible and worry less about what did and did not "look cool", but the car in question was, in fact, cool. The Taiwanese woman also remembered a fiasco were Rotton ran Sawyer's meat van into a group of gasoline drums some months back in attempt to, well, _look cool_. What else? She half-heartedly wondered to herself if Rotton would treat this car the same way, but cast the thought aside when she remembered seeing him wax the vehicle and perform maintenance on it like clockwork for the past two weeks. The car was anything but expendable to the man.

Leaving the topic alone, Shenhua switched to something else.

"It unusual," Shenhua began. "Sawyer get off earlier than normal today. Business in blood slow in Roanapur? Not even have rush job."

"The heat might be the cause," Rotton said. "It seems some people can't work up the motivation to kill in the hotter months." Small beads of sweat rolled down the side of his face. Shenhua put her makeup away in an inner pocket of her red qipao and arched an eyebrow.

"I better not have to drag you home, crazy boy. Talk about heat and you still wear trench coat?"

"It looks cool, and the top on the car is down," he said reassuringly. He supposed it compensated for the air conditioning not being able to work.

"You not look very cool if you faint at wheel and crash car," the Taiwanese woman quipped, brushing her fingers through her raven hair as it flowed in the wind.

"I am fine." For a moment, he broke his cool composure and his voice was hinting at something almost akin to irritation. Shenhua didn't dwell on it and shrugged in response.

"It no matter. Drive not that long. We see Sawyer soon," Shenhua said. "Still, there no big jobs for her in a while. Poor girl must be so bored right now."

- 0 – 0 – 0 -

The chainsaw clattered to concrete ground along with its owner. Sawyer curled up into a ball, wincing in pain.

"Courtesy of Colt," Stretch quipped. "Glad I had a bullet to spare. Now where the hell is my Mossberg?"

"Right here, bitch."

Stretch looked out the corner of her eye. Jenny had picked up her shotgun.

Sawyer watched through squinted eyes as the business end of the weapon met Stretch's temple. Jenny smiled triumphantly.

"Well, well, I guess you were right, Fred. I didn't need you after all."

A horrific static sound emanated from the Ultravoice collar. Sawyer grit her teeth as her hands cupped her right thigh. She glared daggers at both Stretch and Jenny through the dark.

"I guess it woulda been cool if we ended this with some sorta Wild West shootout—very traditional and Texan for us lot— but I don't think cousin Freddy here would've appreciated the damage to this fine establishment. But..." Jenny giggled. "I don't think Fred would mind if I gave her lil' conveyor belt here a paint job. Would ya, Fred-Fred?"

"**Just... shut up... and shoot her...**" she groaned miserly.

"Not even a 'please' or 'thank you'. Mama Sawyer must be rollin' in her grave seeing how rude you turned out to be," Jenny said impudently, then spit to the side. "But this ain't the time to bicker. Time to tie up this loose end."

Jenny placed her finger on the trigger and squeezed.

Stretch's grin never vanished from the dark.

"What the—?" Jenny balked. She slapped the side of the shotgun and placed her finger on the trigger once more. It didn't budge. "The fuck is this piece of shit?"

Stretch grabbed hold of the barrel and the buttstock of the weapon crashed into Jenny's face, promptly knocking her out. She landed on her side. A steel-toed boot casually rolled her onto her back and pressed into her chest. Vanita stood over her body with the shotgun in her hands.

"Guess ya'll aren't as good with guns as you are with hammers and saws," Stretch taunted. "Weapons 101: A pump-action shotgun tends not to work very well when a spent round is still in the chamber." She pumped the Mossberg and an empty shell dropped unceremoniously with a plastic clatter beside Jenny's head. She pressed the barrel against Jenny's forehead, and the unconscious blonde's eyes were blank, goldfish-like before the weapon.

"Now, let me show you how it's _supposed_ to wor—AHH, GOD DAMN IT!"

Once again, as if she were a character written into a tasteless comedy of horrific proportions, Stretch was forced to drop the shotgun.

A bright glint cut through the dark and cold steel bit into the tips of the index and middle fingers on Stretch's left hand. The force of the mystery blade had also knocked the gun out of her grip before it retreated back into the dark. The shotgun swirled away on the floor and disappeared near one of many piles of crates.

"**Shen... hua...**" Sawyer smiled weakly.

_Shit_, Stretch thought. The bitch had reinforcement. She got on her hands and knees, searching for her weapon in the dark. Once she found her shotgun, she swore she would _not_ lose it again. She inwardly cursed herself, also, for not carrying more magazines on her person for the 1911.

The Taiwanese woman inwardly grimaced as she got one of her favorite dresses dirty from rubbing against the grime on the concrete floor as she crouched low. She wasn't counting on a rescue mission today. However, stealth was a trademark of Shenhua's (it was a necessity with a melee weapon).The tricky part would be retrieving Sawyer, as she was so close to the shotgun lady. Sawyer spotted her and they made eye contact. Shenhua made the universal "hush" motion by putting her index finger to her lips and lifted her khukri. The solution was simple: kill shotgun woman and Sawyer would be safe. It would be an effortless endeavor.

"You, wild maiden, who dares to attack a comrade in arms...!"

"_Gàn,_" Shenhua hissed. She placed her hand on the conveyor belt and bumped her head against the mechanism, squinting her eyes as though she were in pain. She told that stupid boy to stay in the car. Now, there he was, standing in front of a large, circular, rotating fan above the rafters of the abattoir holding his Mausers at odd angles. Somehow, someway, he found a way up there, like he always did, and like every encounter, the man had to make a show of it.

Sawyer wanted to cry. She was going to die in her own slaughterhouse.

As the silver-haired man continued with his soliloquy, Vanita "Stretch" continued to crawl on all fours, looking for her Mossberg. Damn, not only could she see next to nothing in the lack of light, but that man's yammering was beginning to get on her nerves.

Her fingertips brushed the stock of her shotgun and she grinned.

"... and it shall be I, Rotton 'the Wizard', who will deliver upon you the final blow that will end your—!"

His speech, as always, was preempted by gunfire. A good chunk of the rafter he was next to splintered into nothing. Though the shot for the most part missed him, a small group of pellets managed to find their way into his left arm. If not for his vest, a few would have found themselves in his chest as well. He fell in shock and tumbled gracelessly down a pyramid of crates.

A flurry of steel throwing daggers lodged themselves in Stretch's arms. True to the promise she had made to herself earlier, she didn't let go of her gun. Ignoring the searing pain in her arms, she aimed the shotgun in the general direction where the blades had come from and fired.

The shot was messy and missed its target. Shenhua took the opportunity to throw her khukri at the woman. It was a blind shot, but it was worth the risk.

The blade bit into Vanita's cheek and struck a box behind her. Shenhua instinctively tugged the rope attached to the khukri. When the blade was pulled back as quickly as it had been embedded, the crate moved forward by an inch.

That inch was enough to cause an avalanche of wooden cubes.

Stretch didn't even have time to utter a curse as the high stack of crates to the ceiling crumbled and buried her.

Sawyer stared, wide eyed yet indifferent to the woman's fate. Shenhua picked the small woman up like a rag doll and slung her over her shoulder. In the other hand, she took Sawyer's chainsaw.

"Rotton, you alive?!" Shenhua called out.

"Yes," Rotton said, pushing a box off his body. He winced as sharp jolts ran through his left arm.

"Good. We get out now! Settle things with Sawyer's new friend later!"

That was all she said before she turned and ran out of the plant with Sawyer. Rotton shortly followed, then stopped when he almost tripped over someone's body.

- 0 – 0 – 0 -

After dumping Sawyer non-too-gently in the back of the convertible Mustang with her chainsaw, Shenhua quickly took out a first aid kit that was under the passenger seat. With her knife, she cut off a good portion of Sawyer's pant leg so she could see the wound and hastily wrapped it.

"Where is Rotton?" Shenhua muttered. "Thought he behind us..."

"I'm right here!" Rotton announced. Shenhua was almost delighted to see him until he dumped another body in the back next to Sawyer. Shenhua looked quizzically at the unconscious blonde with a bloody nose. Sawyer grimaced and tried to push herself away from the body as humanly possible without having to climb out of the back. The woman in surgeon's scrubs had a look on her face as though the other female had some sort of contagious disease.

"Who that bitch?" Shenhua asked in a tone so casual she may as well have been asking about the weather.

Rotton started the engine.

"She was still breathing when I found her," Rotton explained. "It didn't feel right to leave her there."

"**Of course not...**" Sawyer droned. Quickly, the car pulled away from the slaughterhouse. Sawyer didn't bother looking back.

"How your arm?" Shenhua asked Rotton.

"A flesh wound," Rotton said. "A few pellets. Most of it hit the rafter."

"Muuh..." Jenny stirred next to Sawyer. Shenhua looked over. Jenny opened her eyes and immediately distorted her face.

"Ow, shit. My nose hurts," Jenny swore semi-nasally.

"**Here's... a tissue...**" Sawyer shoved a piece of gauze into Jenny's face, making the injury worse.

"Fuck! Fred, the hell is wrong with you?" Jenny snapped. She gingerly took the gauze under her nose and carefully wiped the blood away. There was still a light stain on her upper lip, and the center of her face was beginning to turn red-violet, the beginning of a nasty bruise.

"So, what are we doing here? Last I remember, that crazy bitch was staring down the barrel of her own gun."

"**It's all... your fault...**" Sawyer clarified. "**Uncle Hoyt... is pissing himself... in hell. You didn't... know how to... rack a shotgun...**"

It took a moment for Jenny to realize what Sawyer was implying.

"...So I forgot she had spent slug. La-dee-fuckin'-dah. You forget a lot of things when you're in the dark," Jenny said defensively. "We're alive now. What happened?"

"We save your ass," Shenhua chirped bluntly. "Sawyer, I take you know each other? This friend?"

Before Sawyer could get a word of denial in, Jenny beat her to the punch.

"Why, I am Fred-Fred's first cousin, Jenny Sawyer. I take it by the way we're ridin' in the back of that fine..." Jenny leaned over and took a close look at the driver of the car. Her eyes glimmered. "Oh my, _fine_ gentleman's car, ya'll are mighty close acquaintances of cousin Fred-Fred? She never bothered to tell me she had friends."

Jenny eyed Sawyer with a dark intent. No wonder cousin Fred-Fred said she didn't need her own kin. The cleaner had obviously formed her own little pack.

"Fred-Fred?" Rotton murmured.

"**It's... a nickname...**" Sawyer said. "**She was never... smart enough... to call me... Frederica...**"

"Is she always this mean or is it just 'round me?" Jenny asked, crossing her arms in agitation. "After all we been through, I'd a thought you softened at least a lil' by now. Shit."

"What exactly was happening?" Rotton inquired. "We've never seen that woman before, have we, Shenhua?"

"No," Shenhua said. "She dress like Twinkie Lagoon girl, though, but she not Twinkie. What you do to make her mad, Sawyer?"

"Oh! The stories we could tell," Jenny shouted abruptly. "We could have a whole series based on the clan!"

Jenny caught Sawyer's troubled glance. Was she afraid sweet cousin Jenny would say too much in front of her pack? Hm, so there was still something she could hang over little Fred's head. Food for thought in the very near future.

"But I won't bore you with details," Jenny said, waving her hand up and down in a careless motion. "All ya'll need to know is that the crazy lady has a grudge against the Sawyer family, and it's a real nasty one at that, as you probably well see." Jenny pointed at the bullet wound in Sawyer's thigh.

"Y'see, the woman in the daisy dukes doesn't like our family, or anyone else that associates with us for that matter. So by simply bein' friends with Freddie here, you've put yourself on the bitch's shit list by default."

"We handle her fine," Shenhua said dismissively. "We deal with worse before." The Taiwanese woman fingered the scars on her own thighs, tokens from that hunt for the maid many moons before.

"**Shenhua... don't get... involved...**" Sawyer warned. "**It's... not your... issue...**"

"Really?" Shenhua tittered, amused. "That hole in leg from needle? Are pellets in Rotton's arm dog food? No, that bitch do something serious. I not mind carving meat in off time if it personal."

"**Shenhua... no...**" Sawyer croaked pathetically.

"Sawyer, no worry. We get to better battle ground, we take crazy bitch out, no problem. Things like that, it just regular weekend in Roanapur," Shenhua assured.

Sawyer looked down with a sigh. Jenny nodded approvingly.

"Good. Now that we have that outta the way, I just wanna clarify: Ya'll are familiar with each other?"

"... Yes, we familiar," Shenhua said, lifting an eyebrow questioningly.

"And only _familiar_, huh?" Jenny asked, looking at Rotton again. "So I suppose once this lil' fiasco with the DJ-reject is over, you won't mind if I take some down time with his cool guy here, huh?" Jenny crept a hand onto Rotton's shoulder, then slipped it down his shirt to his chest.

It took all of Rotton's composure not to swerve the car.

Jenny found herself with a knife pointed at her throat.

"**We're... **_**extremely**_**... familiar...**" Sawyer glared.

"Take hand out of shirt, whore girl, before I remove for you," Shenhua threatened. Jenny withdrew her hand and held both of them up in a surrendering gesture with a bemused smirk.

"Oh, _that_ kinda familiar," Jenny said with raised eyebrows. "Well, damn, why didn't ya'll say so? I went and made myself a fool in front of Fred's special friends. My sincerest apologies."

Shenhua drew the knife back and settled back into the passenger seat, turning away from the blonde woman. Jenny looked over at Rotton one more time, and she spoke again.

"I ain't a prude, y'know," Jenny said flatly. "The China girl can join in too, but I think it be best for family ties if Freddie just watched."

Rotton stepped on the brakes.

Shenhua pinned Jenny to the back seat by holding her throat.

"Easy now..." Jenny choked, trying to pry Shenhua's hand off her neck. "It was... just a... joke..."

"Not funny," Shenhua said lowly, her typically jovial eyes now void. She took one of her throwing knives out and pointed it at one of Jenny's eyes.

She almost poked it out when a blast took out the right tail light of Rotton's Mustang.

All four occupants looked down the stretch of tarmac and saw a shadowy figure hanging out of the side of a tuk-tuk with a shotgun in hand. For a brief moment, they all could have sworn they saw two glowing eyes in the distance.

Without hesitation, Rotton stepped on the gas.

- 0 – 0 – 0 -

The saline solution flowed steadily through the IV line. Dreary and gray, the bright yellow sunflowers on the stand next to the hospital bed did nothing to illuminate the grim hospital room. Even the efforts of what little moon beams could make their way around the gaudy, polka-dotted vinyl curtains couldn't liven up the place.

The door creaked open and a slim, liver-spotted hand placed a book on the nightstand, beside the vase of flowers.

"What business is so important as to interrupt my novel of the day? _The Dutchess of Malfi _was beginning to get interesting."

"Well, sir, I..." the Danish man in his early forties, wearing a formal blouse and vest, glanced around the room. He clutched in his hand a suitcase and his eyes focused uneasily on the sunflowers. They were beginning to wilt. "The Texan..."

"What of the Texan, Daan?" inquired the man in the bed. He gently pinched his IV tubing with his forefinger and thumb, rolling it. Daan couldn't bring himself to look into his eyes. The man almost appeared to be a skeleton with skin, but that in itself was not what repulsed him. There was always something unsettling about the sick, _sick_ man's eyes, and it did not help that the small rays of moonlight cast the man as a bony silhouette.

"She found the Cleaner,"Daan said, surprising himself in the steadiness of his tone. "Last I heard, she was trailing her in the tuk-tuk."

The sick man laughed, but the derisive sound was interrupted by a coughing fit.

"So the little one made it out of the plant," he muttered when he regained his composure. "Congratulations to the gamine, and the news on the other one? The blonde?"

"Alive as well, at the moment."

"Anything interesting?"

There was an audible swallow from Daan's throat. The sick man's idea of "interesting" was not synonymous with "pleasant."

"Only in that there are more in the hunt."

The sick man raised an eyebrow.

"Recent news from our rickshaw driver is: the Cleaner linked up with that knife woman Chang seems so fond of, and she's also tagging along with some hack in a trenchcoat."

"Hmm," the sick man scratched the pepper-colored goatee on his chin. "So she's running with a pack, then? Tsk, tsk, so naughty. I told her not to play with others. It takes too much away from individual talent. Young ones just don't listen to the advice of their elders, but it's no matter."

There was a pause, and he smiled grimly.

"Knowing there are more cast members involved, however, does make for a much more interesting show. Such a shame I can't participate in my condition. What games the little one and I could play..."

Daan shuddered. He didn't want to think of the possibilities.

"Ah, but I have _softened_ in my time," the sick man sighed melodramatically, placing the back of his hand on his forehead. "This little arrangement will suffice. Keep me posted, Daan. I don't want to miss a single detail."

"...Yes, sir."

* * *

**A/N:** See? Just what I told you. Saved through the magic of friendship and ponies. Well, a car named after a horse. I can only do so much.

And it only took about 4 months. I suck.

I'll try to be better with the next update, but I make no promises as I may or may not be playing around in a desert for a minute.

Cheers.


End file.
